The first time you saw him, you forgot how to breathe.

It was a quiet café tucked away from the main streets of Edinburgh, a soft drizzle misting the windows. You were reaching for a sugar packet when your hand brushed against his. Warm. Solid. Familiar.

Your eyes met—and the world tilted.

He blinked, something flickering across his face. “Sorry,” he said, accent thick and rolling like a memory you’d forgotten you owned.

You didn’t speak. Couldn’t. Because your heart was hammering so hard you could barely hear the clink of ceramic mugs around you. He looked exactly like the man from your dreams—the man who’d held you close as fire rained down, who’d kissed your forehead beneath a blood-red moon, who’d whispered, "Find me again." Only to die from a headshot wound trying to protect you.

“Are you okay?” he asked, head tilting slightly.

You nodded slowly. “Do I… know you?”

His expression changed—something deep and unspoken blooming behind his eyes. Recognition. He felt it too.

“I dunno,” he said, voice low, “but it feels like I should.”

The dreams had been with you since childhood. Always the same man: buzzed dark hair, a crooked grin, arms covered in soot and blood, a thick Scottish accent calling you love even as he died in your arms. Over and over.

You’d wake with tears on your cheeks, whispering his name though you never remembered it.

Now, standing in front of him, you finally did.

“Johnny,” you breathed. “Your name is Johnny.”

He looked stunned.

“No one calls me that but family,” he said cautiously. “How did you—?”

“I dreamed of you,” you said. “In another life. I think I knew you.”

You met again. Once turned into twice. Twice into every evening spent walking through the misty streets, talking until the lamplights blinked out.

The dreams returned. But now, they were clearer. More detailed. You saw trenches, war-torn villages, the two of you in different bodies, always side by side. In armor. In ragged clothing. In sleek modern gear, hiding behind crumbling walls with rifles in your hands. Sometimes you died first. Sometimes he did.

But in every lifetime, you found each other. Only to lose each other again.

One night, seated under a sky littered with stars, Johnny murmured, “I used to have dreams like that too. Long before I met you. But I’d forgotten them until now. It's like seeing you lit the fuse again.”

You turned to him. “Then you believe it?”

He smiled softly, tracing the back of your hand with calloused fingers. “I don’t just believe it, love. I know. I’d know you anywhere.”

But fate, cruel as it always was, didn’t care how many times you found each other.

Johnny was deployed six months later.

He left with a promise: “I’ll come back. I always do.”

But then came the news. A mission gone wrong. No recovery. Presumed dead.

You shattered.

Not just because you lost him, but because it was happening again. Like all the lifetimes before.

For weeks, you couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t eat. Could barely breathe. You wandered your flat like a ghost, haunted by the weight of love lost once more.

Until one stormy night, a knock came at your door.

You opened it, expecting a neighbor.

And there he was.

Soaked, bloody, limping—but alive.

He didn’t even get a word out before you were in his arms, sobbing into his neck.

“I came back,” he whispered. “This time—I fought to come back. I remembered. I knew if I didn’t… you’d be alone again.”

You pulled back just enough to cup his face. “You always find me.”

“And I always will,” he promised. “No more lifetimes without you. Not if I can help it.”